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1Agrippa said to Paul, “It is permitted for you to speak for yourself.” Then Paul stretched out his hand and began his defense.

2“Concerning all I am accused of by the Judean leaders, I consider myself fortunate, King Agrippa, that it is before you that I am about to make my defense today—

3since you are especially knowledgeable about all Jewish customs and issues. Therefore I beg you to listen patiently to me.

4“Now all the Jewish people have known my manner of life ever since my youth, starting from the beginning in my own nation and also in Jerusalem.

5They have known about me for a long time—if they were willing to testify—that according to the strictest sect of our religion, I lived as a Pharisee.

6“Yet now I stand here being judged for the hope in the promise made by God to our fathers.

7It is the promise that our twelve tribes hope to attain, as they earnestly worship night and day. And for this hope I am accused by Jewish people, O King!

8Why is it judged incredible by any of you that God raises the dead?

9“In fact, I myself thought it was necessary to do many things in opposition to the name of Yeshua ha-Natzrati.

10And that is what I did in Jerusalem. Not only did I lock up many of the kedoshim in prisons by the authority I received from the ruling kohanim, but I cast my vote against them when they were being condemned to death.

11I tried to cause them to blaspheme by punishing them often in the synagogues. In furious rage against them, I persecuted them even in foreign cities.

12“While journeying to Damascus with the authority and commission of the ruling kohanim,

13at midday, O King, I saw on the road a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining around me and those traveling with me.

14When we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in Aramaic, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting Me? It is hard for you to kick against goads!’

16But get up, and stand on your feet. For I have appeared to you for this purpose—to appoint you as a servant and witness to the things you have seen as well as to the things I will yet reveal to you.

17I will rescue you from your own people, and from the Gentiles to whom I am sending you,

18to open their eyes—so they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of satan to God, that they may receive release from sins as well as a place among those who are made holy through trusting in Me.’

19“Therefore, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision.

20Rather, I kept declaring—first to those in Damascus, and then Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea, and also the Gentiles—that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds consistent with that repentance.

21“For this reason some Judeans seized me in the Temple and tried to put me to death.

22Since I have had God’s help, to this day I have stood here testifying to both small and great. I am saying nothing but what the Prophets and Moses said was going to happen—

23that the Messiah was to suffer and that, being first to rise from the dead, He would proclaim light both to our people and to the nations.”

24As Paul was thus making his defense, Festus says with a loud voice, “You’re crazy, Paul! Your great learning is driving you insane!”